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Jim Magilton has just started his second season in charge of Ipswich after replacing Joe Royle in the summer of 2006. His first season saw them finish in fourteenth place, one place higher than in the previous season, and this season they are currently fifteenth in the table.
Ipswich have been back in this league now for six seasons since suffering relegation from the Premiership under George Burley. Royle twice took them into the play offs but once the parachute money disappeared even their cute move into administration didn't prevent them having to sell players.
Magilton, a player under Royle, was given the task of challenging for a return to the top flight. He made a number of high profile signings a year ago, including such as Sylvain Legwinski from Fulham, and added further to his squad last January.
This summer he was able to add to his squad with three new signings and two of them were familiar figures to Portman Road. Pablo Counago had been released previously by Royle whilst Tommy Miller had opted to move on to Sunderland. Both of them have now returned. The three signings are:
Neil Alexander from Cardiff
Tommy Miller from RK Sunderland
It is fair to say there have been two Ipswich Towns this season, the one that plays at Portman Road and the one that plays away from home. At home they haven't dropped a point whilst away from home they have collected just the one point from a draw at Plymouth.
To add to that they went out of the Carling Cup in the first round. After drawing at Franchise they went out in a penalty shoot out.
Burnley will no doubt be hoping that Ipswich continue as they have been doing away from home. We need to be getting our first home win since the opening day of the season.
Ipswich striker Alan Lee first came to the attention of Burnley fans in the summer of 1999 when out of the blue we were linked with the 21-year-old Irishman then playing for Aston Villa.
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He cost us £200,000 but for one reason his Burnley career failed to take off and he was never able to win himself a regular place in the first team. He did miss some of his first season with injury but managed only two league starts alongside thirteen substitute appearances.
He'll perhaps best be remembered for an horrendous miss just before the end of a key game at Wigan that was drawn 1-1 but just after that he scored his only Burnley goal at the same ground in an Associate Members tie.
Following promotion in 2000 he failed to get anywhere near the first team and after a loan spell with Rotherham he moved there on a permanent basis for £150,000. He had considerable success with the Millmoor club under the management of Ronnie Moore. He helped them to promotion in 2001 and went on to score goals for them in the then First Division.
He always seemed to do well against the Clarets and he scored twice in Rotherham's 6-2 win at the Turf at the end of 2002, but at the end of the 2002/03 season he signed for Cardiff in a £850,000 transfer. That was a boost to the Clarets who collected some more money after having agreed a sell on clause with Rotherham.
His time in Wales was never as successful and he had a poor scoring record for them. That didn't concern Joe Royle and in January 2006 he took him to Ipswich where he has become a big favourite.
He's still managed to upset Burnley, none more so than when he conned the referee into an outrageous penalty decision two seasons ago against Michael Duff, a decision that upset acting captain Wayne Thomas so much he was red carded.
He'd scored earlier in that game and also netted their late equaliser against us last December, taking his total of goals against the Clarets to four.
Manager Jim Magilton has promised changes after Ipswich were beaten 3-1 at Hull on Saturday. He was not happy with the performance and almost immediately after the game said that some players would lose their places.
One player definitely coming in tonight is right back David Wright. He was missing on Saturday after suffering a heal injury during the week and was replaced by Chris Casement. One other change could see Sylvain Legwinski get just his second start of the season.
We've already said that Alan Lee is one to watch, but his place could also be in jeopardy whilst Magilton has also hinted at a change of system (with former Accrington Stanley wide man Gary Roberts dropping out) and possible recalls for Jaime Peters and Danny Haynes, two players who have been used solely as substitutes this season. He's named a squad of eighteen players and he will select from them.
Possible line up: Neil Alexander, David Wright, Jason De Vos, Alex Bruce, Dan Harding, Jonathan Walters, Owen Garvan, Sylvain Legwinski, Danny Haynes, Pablo Counago, Alan Lee. Subs from: Shane Supple, Tommy Miller, Gary Roberts, Chris Casement, Jaime Peters, Fabian Wilnis, Billy Clarke.
Burnley will still be without midfielder Chris McCann whilst Michael Duff is also added to the injured list although we still await news of the seriousness of the injury. Duff's injury will almost certainly see Graham Alexander getting his first start at right back which means both of the regular central midfield pairing, Alexander and McCann, will be missing from that area of the pitch.
Alan Mahon came in for McCann on Saturday and John Spicer was used as a substitute when Duff went off, and it wouldn't be a surprise to see Steve Cotterill keep faith with them. And Clarke Carlisle, who was involved in a road accident on Friday that saw his car in a ditch and written off, will be ok to continue in the centre of defence.
Burnley's likely team is: Gabor Kiraly, Graham Alexander, Clarke Carlisle, Steven Caldwell, Stephen Jordan, Wade Elliott, John Spicer, Alan Mahon, Kyle Lafferty, Robbie Blake, Andy Gray. Subs from: Brian Jensen, David Unsworth, James O'Connor, Steve Jones, Ade Akinbiyi, Jon Harley, Joey Gudjonsson.
Chris McCann will miss tonight's game but this is a fixture he'll certainly have good memories of from the last seasons. In 2005/06 he scored his first ever first team goal and last season he was played in the centre of defence and popped up to score the stoppage time winner.
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Ipswich got off to a good start and for the first twenty minutes were very much in the ascendancy although without troubling us too much and we restricted them to very little in the way of chances.
It all changed after our first chance when McCann got in a powerful shot that was goal bound until a defender got across to block it. From then we were the better side and the only time we looked in any danger was when Gary Roberts was going down to win free kicks.
The goal wouldn't come and in the last ten minutes we came close to losing when Gary Roberts had a goal dubiously disallowed for offside. You see there is justice, it was what Roberts deserved.
A week earlier a late goal from Andy Gray had won it for us, but deep into stoppage time it looked as though we would have to settle for a point. We won one last corner and somewhat surprisingly it was central defender Duff who took it.
It went short to Alan Mahon who in turn chipped the ball to the far post where McCann gleefully headed the ball home to clinch the three points. There was just time for Phil Joslin, who had a shocking game, to send off Micah Hyde for a supposed second bookable offence.
The win took us third in the league, and set us up nicely for a trip to leaders Cardiff on the Saturday.
The teams were;
Burnley: Brian Jensen, Frank Sinclair, Michael Duff, Chris McCann, Jon Harley, Wade Elliott (Alan Mahon 78), James O'Connor, Micah Hyde, Steve Jones (John Spicer 84), Gifton Noel-Williams (Kyle Lafferty 87), Andy Gray. Subs not used: Danny Coyne, Wayne Thomas.
Ipswich: Shane Supple, Alex Bruce (Luis Castro Sito 58), Jason De Vos, Richard Naylor, Dan Harding, Mark Noble, Simon Walton, Sylvain Legwinski, Matt Richards, Gary Roberts, Alan Lee. Subs not used: Jaroslav Drobny, Jaime Peters, Darren Currie, Danny Haynes.
Previous 20 Seasons | |||||
Season | Div | Ven | Result | Att | Scorers |
2002/03 | 1 | a | 2-2 | 22,736 | Gnohere Papadopoulos |
| . | . | h | 1-1 | 15,501 | Blake(pen) |
2003/04 | 1 | a | 1-6 | 22,048 | Facey |
| . | . | h | 4-2 | 11,343 | Little May Chaplow Blake |
2004/05 | C | a | 1-1 | 23,183 | Blake |
| . | . | h | 0-2 | 11,969 | . |
2005/06 | C | h | 3-0 | 10,496 | J O'Connor G O'Connor McCann |
| . | . | a | 1-2 | 24,482 | Ricketts |
2006/07 | C | h | 1-0 | 11,709 | McCann |
| . | . | a | 1-1 | 20,254 | Lafferty |